


benediction

by goukyorin (sashimisusie)



Series: her rank equals mine [4]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-24
Updated: 2015-02-24
Packaged: 2018-03-14 21:36:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3426407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sashimisusie/pseuds/goukyorin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Left Hand has been made bitter and cold, and with a slow dawning of realization that rivals the sunrise bleeding red and pink over the snow-capped Frostbacks, she realizes that Leliana cannot see how brightly her own light burns.</p>
            </blockquote>





	benediction

**Author's Note:**

  * For [varentains (storminlover)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/storminlover/gifts).



“ You deserve better. ”

“ What? ”

“ You deserve so much more, Cassandra. Who could ever love a bard? ”

The words leave Leliana as if torn, yanked from a place deep-buried and left untended before being pieced together with good intentions. There is a bitterness to it that burns, cold as the ice that rims the windowpanes and leaves the Seeker’s wrists—old wounds and healed-over fractures—aching on the worst of the days. The Left Hand has been made bitter and cold, and with a slow dawning of realization that rivals the sunrise bleeding red and pink over the snow-capped Frostbacks, she realizes that Leliana cannot see how brightly her own light burns.

“ I could. ”

Leliana laughs, but it sounds like broken glass, jagged and cut from a whole. “ You can’t promise me that. You will see a horrible part of me, a part you never thought existed, and decide that you no longer feel the same way. ”

Unsaid, unspoken: _they all do._ She shakes her head, what few words remain to her falling by the wayside and into the abyss that seems to have sprung up in the scant few feet between them.

“ I don’t know if I can handle that. ”

There was a room with a candle, burning bright even as her knees cried for reprieve from the cold floor and her belly sought something more filling than prayer. The candle’s flame flickers, the memory shatters, and that moment of perfect faith shines clear as the blue sky reflected in Leliana’s eyes when she turns her gaze to the heavens above as she so rarely does. With that, the Seeker finds herself again and knows what must be done.

“ Listen to me, Leliana, ” she says, almost cursing her clumsiness with words. But perhaps, just perhaps, her blundering is what is necessary. Bridging the divide with a long-legged stride, she takes up hands left slack by their sides between her own. It is as much a balm to Cassandra’s heart—its fibres run ragged and weary from loss and love, but it still beats, it beats—as a benediction when Leliana’s head inclines minutely in response to it all.

“ Listen to me, ” Cassandra repeats, scarcely able to hear herself for the sound of blood and fire in her ears. It must be her own heartbeat, for whose else could be in her skin, stumbling over the words that need saying most of all? She does not need to speak of love, for they both know that there is nothing she does not do without all of her heart, and she does not need to speak of loyalty. “ You have seen me at my worst, and only the Maker knows of our true selves. But you have endured, as I will should such a thing come to pass. ”

She needs to speak of the grace in the Left Hand’s walk down the stairs, the gentle trill of a birdcall that carries down to the library where she argues with Dorian over what novel to read next. She needs to speak of the unquenchable flame that flickers, falters, but does not fail, and the faith that bleeds from Leliana’s cracks. She needs, drawing in a shuddering breath to ready her words, to let her know that there is but one person who has managed to stay in the darkness for so long and come out garbed in light as bright as Andraste herself.

Leliana’s lips are parted, teeth just visible behind the soft curve of pink, and _**oh**_ , Cassandra thinks, _this is the part where we kiss, isn’t it?_

She wants so very much to lean in those few inches between them to close the gap. She wants, the need of it as strong as her grip on the woman’s hands, but this is not one of her stories, Fact is harder to deal with than any fiction, and when Cassandra lowers her gaze to turn the metaphorical page in her mind to consult what to do next, the next page is blank.

“ It is enough, Leliana. ”

They’ll write it out together, then. Without a script, and with only the barest outlines of a plan. Together, as it has been, as it should be, and as it will continue to be for as long as either of them draw breath into their weary lungs.

“ You have been and will always be enough. ”


End file.
